Tricycle Blog

Last Friday, members of Thich Nhat Hanh's Blue Cliff Monastery brought a little mindfulness to Union Square. About 100 participants staged a "meditation flash mob" in the middle of the busy park, contrasting their frantic surroundings with complete silence. Facing five robed monks, the eclectic group of meditators sat silently for 30 minutes, as locals and tourists alike crowded around in wonder.
After the sitting meditation, the group created even more of a stir when they began walking meditation up Broadway. New Yorkers' gazes were forced momentarily away from their smartphones and onto the slow-moving religious crowd, blocking their path on the sidewalk. The smartphones, of course, were then used to snap the necessary Instagram pictures.
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"A Life Too Long" is a heart-wrenching story of terminal illness, modern medicine, and family. The article, adapted from Katy Butler's new book, Knocking on Heaven's Door, was a hit with the Tricycle community. And word is spreading. This week, The New York Times reviewed Butler's new book:
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Positive psychology gurus and coaches give lots of advice about how we should lead our lives. Their threat is that if we don’t follow their advice, we will not only be unhappy, we risk sickness and death.
When Barbara Ehrenreich’s Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America was published outside of the United States, the book was retitled Smile or Die. The publisher was concerned that non-native English speakers might not understand the play on words in the original title. I think the retitling is actually more apt in capturing the message of positive psychology: buy our advice, buy our books, attend our workshops or die.
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Biography and autobiography in Tibet are important sources for both education and inspiration. The authors involved in the Treasury of Lives mine primary sources to provide English-language biographies of every known religious teacher from Tibet and the Himalaya, all of which are organized on their website. The following summarizes the biography of the 6th Dalai Lama, Tsangyang Gyatso, by Simon Wickham-Smith.
Poet Saints, Part 2: The 6th Dalai Lama
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(RNS) Buddhists are killing Muslims in Burma with impunity because the government failed to stop the attacks, New York-based Physicians for Human Rights reported amid fresh assaults that left more Muslims homeless.
During the past year, scattered clashes across Buddhist-majority Myanmar, also known as Burma, have left more than 240 people dead, most of them Muslims.
A mob of about 1,000 Buddhists burned more than 35 Muslim homes and a dozen shops on August 24 in Kanbalu in Burma's central Sagaing Division after hearing rumors that a Muslim man sexually assaulted a young Buddhist woman, police told The Associated Press.
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In April 2006, the Japanese cultural anthropologist Noriyuki Ueda met the Dalai Lama for two days of conversation in Dharmasala, India. The discussion, recently translated from the Japanese text, covers such topics as the usefulness of anger, the role of compassion in society, and social and economic justice. "I believe that Buddhism has a big role to play in the world today," Ueda tells His Holiness, "and I am impatient because Buddhists don't seem to realize that." In this interview, Ueda offers us a rare peek into the the political and economic mind of one of the world's most famous spiritual leaders.
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Biography and autobiography in Tibet are important sources for both education and inspiration. The authors involved in the Treasury of Lives are currently mining the primary sources to provide English-language biographies of every known religious teacher from Tibet and the Himalaya, all of which are organized for easy searching and browsing. Every Tuesday on the blog, we will highlight and reflect on important, interesting, eccentric, surprising and beautiful stories found within this rich literary tradition. The following summarizes the biography of Zhabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol written by Matthieu Ricard.
Poet Saints, Part 1: Zhabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol
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Hozan Alan Senauke is a Soto Zen priest, activist, and the former director of Buddhist Peace Fellowship. He is an advisor to the International Network of Engaged Buddhists and founder of the Clear View Project, which focuses on social change and relief efforts in Asia. He also happens to be an accomplished folk musician.
In March, Radio host John Malkin interviewed Senauke on his show “The Great Leap Forward” on Free Radio Santa Cruz. The two spoke about the confluence of Buddhism and social justice, Buddhist Anarchism, and where Engaged Buddhism stands today.
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(RNS) The government of Malaysia expelled a group of Singaporean tourists for chanting Buddhist prayers inside an Islamic prayer room where they erected a large Buddhist painting on the wall facing Mecca.
The government also revoked the permanent resident visa of the businessman who allowed the Buddhists to pray at his beach resort in Johor state, about 185 miles south of Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Muslim-majority Malaysia.
The government’s response is the latest in a series of crackdowns on behavior deemed disrespectful of Islamic traditions and beliefs.
A Malaysian human rights group, Lawyers for Liberty, protested the action.
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Biography and autobiography in Tibet are important sources for both education and inspiration. The authors involved in the Treasury of Lives are currently mining the primary sources to provide English-language biographies of every known religious teacher from Tibet and the Himalaya, all of which are organized for easy searching and browsing. Every Tuesday on the blog, we will highlight and reflect on important, interesting, eccentric, surprising and beautiful stories found within this rich literary tradition. This biography summarizes the life of Jangchub Tsondru on the Treasury of Lives by Françoise Pommaret.
Jangchub Tsondru
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The current media vogue is to construe racism as something neo-Nazis, skinheads, or other marginal bigots do. This absolves the rest of us from taking responsibility not just for individual acts of discrimination and bias on a daily basis, but also for the ways in which white supremacy reinforces and guarantees white skin privilege. Racism in the US is not primarily about individual acts of ill will. One can be benign, neutral, open, accepting, and friendly to people of color and still be participating in the perpetuation of racism in this country merely by not actively working against racial hierarchies.
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Most children expect a day of carefree fun and enjoyment when visiting a theme park. Singapore's Haw Par Villa, however, aims to educate its visitors. That is, through grotesque and terrifying 3D displays of Buddhist hells.
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Biography and autobiography in Tibet are important sources for both education and inspiration. Tibetans have kept such meticulous records of their teachers that thousands of names are known and discussed in a wide range of biographical material. All these names, all these lives—it can be a little overwhelming. The authors involved in the Treasury of Lives are currently mining the primary sources to provide English-language biographies of every known religious teacher from Tibet and the Himalaya, all of which are organized for easy searching and browsing.
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In 1992 I was visiting a Buddhist friend, and saw a copy of Beneath a Single Moon: Buddhism in Contemporary American Poetry (Shambhala Publications, 1991) sitting on the table. Intrigued, I picked it up and scanned the table of contents to see which American poets had been selected for inclusion in the anthology’s 358 pages. I remember dropping the book as though it had burnt me. It was an instinctive response, something I didn’t even think about or try to explain to myself at the time. After that I just purposefully forgot the book even existed.
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On Sunday evening a bomb blast rocked the Ekayana Buddhist Centre, a temple for Jarkarta’s Chinese Buddhists in the western area of Indonesia’s capital, leaving three members of the 300-person congregation with minor injuries. A second explosive device was found undetonated, smoldering in a bucket, with a note that read, “We respond to the screams of the Rohingya.”
Although loaded with “buckshot, batteries, and other materials,” the explosives were incapable of a major blast, a police spokesman told the Wall Street Journal, noting that the explosion failed to break the glass of a nearby door.
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For months members of the House of Representatives wrangled over how much in cuts they would make to the nation’s food stamps program in the new Farm Bill they were drafting. On July 11th, by a vote of 216 to 208, the House finally passed a bill, and guess what? The bill does not include any funding for food stamps. Opposition to the bill was strong—all Democrats joined by twelve Republicans voted against it—but the majority prevailed, reflecting the agenda of Tea Party ideologues and conservative deficit hawks who dominate in the House.
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Preeminent sociologist of religion and Tricycle contributor Robert N. Bellah has passed away after complications following a minor surgery. He was 86.
Bellah had most recently served as the Elliot Professor of Sociology, Emeritus, at the University of California at Berkeley. Through his teaching and writing throughout his post there, his ideas spread far beyond the academy to greatly impact our understanding of religion and spirituality in the culture at large. In 2000, he received the National Humanities Medal from President Bill Clinton in recognition of his accomplishments.
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